Your Goose Is Cooked (A LaTisha Barnhart Mystery) (14 page)

“Didn’t think you’d be so perky.”

Hardy grimaced, or was that a grin?
Hard to tell with his swollen cheeks.
“Got up a few hours ago and took the last of the sample packs he gave me.”

“
Which reminds me to get that prescription filled quick-like.
Need to get to the Goose too. Elizabeth can’t do it all herself.”

Hardy lifted his head, his cheeks still swollen, his words still garbled. “I can help. I’m
feel
okay.”

“Right now.
In a couple of hours it’s going to hit you all over again. Your cheeks are puffy. No, you take the day off and
do
some prowling around for me until you get so tired you need to lay yourself down.”

Hardy went still, his face averted. “You don’t like my teeth, do you?”

His question caught me by surprise, but it shouldn’t have. We knew each other real good. His cocoa eyes were looking for the truth now, and I knew I’d better lay it out. “I’m guessing it’s the full set. I’ve looked at your gold tooth all these
years,
it just seems strange to be staring at all those teeth in your head.”

“I miss my gold one too. I was thinking about asking Dr.
Cryer
to go ahead and plate one of the front ones.”

I caught his chin between my finger and thumb and titled his head. “Smile for me.”

He did, and I studied the situation up close, gums still swollen and red. I hated the thought of him finally getting his teeth fixed and
me
telling him I liked him better the old way. “You know, I think it’s just going to take some time, but a gold tooth in front would help.”

We helped each other up off the floor. Hardy rubbed his stomach, and I knew what was coming. “What do I get to eat this morning?”

“Grits, oatmeal, or chicken broth.”

He scrunched up his nose.

“Take it or leave it, but I
gotta
scoot.”

He opted for chicken broth, not being an oatmeal fan, and went upstairs to take his shower. Grits would have been a fine choice, but he likes them with some ham or bacon most times, to give them some flavor. His choice worked for me. I gave the broth a spin in the microwave, set it on the table with a spoon, and beat it toward the door. I had my hand on the knob when I paused. I no longer heard the shower going, so I yelled one last thing up the steps at him. “You keep your ear to the ground!”

No answer. Must be standing in his shorts staring at himself in the mirror. He did it every morning. And they say women are vain.

“Hardy!”

No use. Sometimes the old methods get the best results. I backtracked to the broom handle leaning against the table in the foyer and beat it straight up against the ceiling, satisfied to see a string of new dents. This was my tried-and-true method for getting Hardy’s attention.

“I heard you, woman, don’t you go beating anymore dents.”

“There’s
gonna
be a dent in your head if you don’t stop ignoring me.”

No answer.

I tapped at the ceiling.

He howled. “I’ll stop by Dr.
Cryer’s
office and talk to him. And I’ll spend some time walking around town and seeing what I can pick up on.”

“Especially Aidan’s jewelry store,” I reminded.

“That too.”

Satisfied, I replaced my stick and slammed the door to let him know I was gone.

William surprised me. Not only was he working, but he had already started Elizabeth on kneading a batch of grain bread for the evening meal. He must have come in real early to get bread started and to this point. He lifted his hand in a little wave my way when I came into view.

Elizabeth, flour dusting her upper lip, winked. “William was here when I arrived. Since he was mixing up some dough, I figured I might as well learn his secrets.”

William kept watching Elizabeth’s kneading. As usual he acted as if he hadn’t heard a word she’d said. I wondered what had pushed him to come out this morning, though I was mighty happy he had. Breakfast is one of the easiest meals for me to handle, and with the extra help of Elizabeth, I knew they would make out all right if I took off to do a little detecting.

I caught the scent of cinnamon and lifted a corner of a towel covering a large tray. An entire pan of sweet cinnamon rolls stared right back at me.

William came up beside me and shooed my hand away. I got the message and lowered the towel. I turned to him and tilted my head toward the back door. His eyes went huge and he shook his head. I bulged my eyes out, tilted my head toward the back door again,
then
ran a finger across my neck.

William beat me out the door.

“You can’t keep this up forever,” I started in on him once we hit the door and it closed behind us. I sucked in a deep breath of the rain-saturated air. Police tape hindered us going more than three feet off the back landing. They had cordoned off the entire alley, as I’d suspected they would. “Elizabeth isn’t a fool and she’ll figure it out soon enough. Most folks will.”

He lowered his head.

 
“You’ve made the first step toward coming
back,
why not go all the way?”

I would let him stew on that for a while. I pointed my finger up the alley toward Regina’s salon. “Is that the Dumpster you hid in?”

He nodded.

“While I’m thinking on it, Elizabeth is my new help. I hired her last night. She lost her little girl a few months back and is doing her best to pay some bills. Do you think you could bake up some bread to sell at a fund-raiser in their honor?”

William didn’t even flinch at the news, though I saw the compassion in his eyes. He worked his mouth, priming it to produce words, I hoped. “I can do breads. I spent most of the evening thinking about Aidan and working on dough.”

“Here I thought you got here nice and early to take out those cinnamon rolls to thaw.”

He got a sheepish look and shrugged. “All they needed was to rise. My DLX can mix a lot of dough, so I brought it in to make things here.”

Poolish
.
The starter thing he’d done at my house. “You used
a what
to mix dough?” I felt caught up the middle pages of some slang dictionary.

My question squeezed a smile out of William. “DLX is the brand mixer I use. It holds a lot of dough and kneads it for you.”

It intrigued me.
Really.
My aunt raised me on homemade bread. “Why don’t we do up some breads this weekend at your place? I’ve got a chocolate cake to make for a little girl. You can help me with that too.”

His grin reached his ears. “That would be fun.”

We needed to hurry through this conversation and open up. I dove right in. “Chief talked to you yet?”

“No.” He stared off down the alley in the direction of Regina’s shop. “I didn’t see that man.
Didn’t hear anything.”

Looking at his profile, the shadows in his eyes, I believed him. “Did you go out the alley that way?”

“No. I walked down the path between Regina’s and the grocery store.”

Bingo. “Did you see anyone?”

A line formed between his eyes. “I saw Eugene and Betsy going into the grocery store.”

Chapter Fifteen

When William mentioned the grocery store, a storm brewed in my brain. What a perfect cover. To do the deed, then slide into the grocery store for a little shopping. Act dumb when the murder is mentioned or . . . Did Betsy’s
shock mean
she thought Eugene had a reason to shoot Aidan? I huffed, my brain sizzling with all the possibilities. First off, I’d have to check with some of the cashiers and Shiny to see who came and went around the time of Aidan’s death. I had some peaches to pick up at the store anyhow, why not do some detecting?

“I didn’t do it,
LaTisha
. I promise you.”

Under normal circumstances, I would be shy on believing someone so bent on declaring his innocence. It always held true with my babies, from the time their tongues wagged fast enough to stir trouble, the guilty one among them always yelped the loudest.

Instead of answering, I popped open the heavy exit door. William followed me back inside. One glance at the kitchen showed no sign of Elizabeth. I figured she was doing something in the front and trundled through to the counter area only to discover Elizabeth sitting across from George. Neither of them appeared happy. Wisdom told me to retreat, but I could see through the window of the front door, my line of early-morning regulars waiting for me to flip the sign and unlock the door. Torn, I went out far enough into the dining room to raise my eyebrows at Elizabeth.

“Vultures are waiting for the morning feed. You two need a few more minutes?”

George turned his face my way. “Go ahead. If I don’t leave soon, I’ll be late for work.” He rose and leaned over to land a kiss on Elizabeth’s cheek. Her answering smile lasted until he turned his back.

Seeing this made me wonder if George, even in his state of grief, would abandon Elizabeth for a woman like Betsy. Some things don’t make sense, and that made as much sense as a recipe for fried tofu.

Elizabeth jumped up and joined me as I let George out and flipped the sign to
Open
.

“Sorry,
LaTisha
, they probably saw me let George in and thought we were open earlier than normal.”

I dismissed her explanation. “Nah, it’s the same crowd that hovers around here every morning.” That’s when I laid down the bomb. “I’m going to leave things to you and William. Be gone through lunch. I’ve got myself some loose ends to tie up.”

Elizabeth’s flash of enthusiasm left me feeling old. “It’s not a problem. Hardy needs you. I’m sure we can handle things.”

Well now, she assumed it. I saw no need to serve up the real explanation. I made my exit through the back kitchen door, wanting to eyeball what I could.
 

Technicians worked with little enthusiasm. Rain, a crime scene technician’s enemy, would no doubt have slowed the clue-gathering process. Clues are too easily washed away, plus they didn’t know about William in time. I expected the scene would be released sometime today, which meant I could do some serious looking soon. Until then, I’d satisfy myself with getting a lay of the scene.

Though Regina’s dumpster fell within the cordoned off area, the footpath William used as his exit did not.

Mentally, I tried to put myself in William’s skin. Here is a man, abused by his father physically and emotionally over a period of many years. He’d also have some abandonment issues going on. In my experience, only the Lord can give peace to a person with those problems. Hardy had struggled for years with his father’s abandonment. I, too, had dealt with the same head drama.

William might be nothing more than a shy man with an unfortunate past who has learned that standing up for himself gets him ridiculed. His silence, even his preference to ignore people by pretending to be deaf, seemed in keeping with what I knew of his childhood trauma. From an investigator’s point of view, it still would not exempt him from being suspect.

Since the alley bent at a right angle, conforming to the corner upon which it sat, at least one of those footpaths led out onto the property behind Aidan’s jewelry store. It didn’t take my degree to know his shop would be investigated.
 

So William was running into the alley toward Regina’s, fearing being shot from behind. The steps from the landing on which I stood emptied in the direction of Regina’s shop. I eyed what I could see of the footpath, which wasn’t much. Why would someone afraid of being shot not hide right off? Nerves, I guessed. When William’s brain finally kicked in and told him to hide, he’d done so in the one place most people would never consider an option. Regina’s Dumpster had the side rolled open for easier access since she wasn’t real tall.

“I see the wheels spinning.”

I started and spun around.

Chief walked up to me from his spot in the off-limits alley. “You looked deep in thought.”

“I hope you’re out here doing something besides trying to scare this black woman into cardiac arrest.”

He chuckled. “Sorry,
LaTisha
, but I knew by your expression that some theory was spinning madly.”